Metadata can ease data overload, making it an area business should
be watching closely
Few people bother to look at the code underlying Web sites they
visit, but it is often worth doing so - not just to see how good
pages are put together, but to examine any metadata lurking there.
For metadata - data about data - is becoming an increasingly
important area of Web technology (the World Wide Web Consortium has
some
background
on the subject).
The reason is simple: metadata offers a way of easing the data
overload that the Web has exacerbated. By building in extra
information to Web pages it will be possible for search engines,
for example, to offer more useful results, and for data exchange -
vitally important for the future of e-commerce - to be
facilitated.
One page that is worth exploring in this way is that of the
e-envoy. I wrote
about this page from the point of view of its content a few weeks
back, and since then it has added an important document outlining
the Government's policy on
open source software.
The metadata it contains is part of a broader initiative called the
E-Government Metadata Standard. This, in turn, is but
one component of the
E-Government Interoperability Framework. There are
documents covering the two parts of this, the first on general
issues, the second on technical matters.
The best introduction to the Government's metadata plans is an
earlier paper on the
E-Government Metadata Framework (e-GMF). As well as
providing a good starting point, it represents the formal
announcement of two crucial elements of the interoperability
framework.
The first is the development of a
pan-government thesaurus, which is "a structured list of
terms and keywords to help us define information accurately and
find information faster" according to the e-GMF. This may sound
simple enough, but is in fact an ambitious scheme which is still in
its early stages. Minutes of various meetings working towards this
goal are
online.
The other important announcement in the metadata framework paper
was that the first version of the e-GMF would be based on the
Dublin Core metadata initiative. Since I wrote about the Dublin
Core a year ago its
main
site has expanded considerably, reflecting the growing
importance of this metadata standard in the online world - not
least because of its adoption by
governments.
Looking at the online information
about the Dublin
Core - including its
history -
reveals that the Dublin involved is in Ohio, not Ireland. There are
various
documents
available, including
recommendations,
proposed
recommendations and
working
drafts.
Other
resources include a
FAQ, a
list of current projects based on Dublin Core
metadata, and a
list of related
tools and
software.
The thoroughgoing nature of the Government's metadata initiative is
impressive, and it will provide a useful - and high-profile -
test-bed of the routine and rigorous use of metadata across a large
organisation. Businesses should keep an eye on developments - as
well as on all that metadata.
Next week: Helix